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Posted to community@apache.org by "Jean T. Anderson" <jt...@apache.org> on 2006/07/28 16:49:26 UTC
women@a.o mail list
The women@apache.org mail list was created in August 2005; the initial
charter is at http://wiki.apache.org/Women/InitialCharter .
We now want to take it to the next step and create a formal committee
(see the forwarded post below).
Since the women@ list isn't well publicized, I'd like to get the word
out that it exists, so feel free to forward this to other Apache lists.
Also, we're looking for more volunteers, so if this seems like a fish
you'd like to fry [1], you'd be most welcome.
regards,
-jean
[1]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%3c44B7E4DB.5090209@sbcglobal.net%3e
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [PROPOSAL] Move women@ to a project or committee
Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 20:34:21 -0700
From: Jean T. Anderson <jt...@bristowhill.com>
Reply-To: women@apache.org, jta@bristowhill.com
To: women@apache.org
My post earlier this week [1] was buried in a response to an older
thread, so I'm reviving it with its very own subject. This post
summarizes the main points and includes feedback from earlier in the week.
women@ should become a project or committee (specific structure to be
determined). Some reasons include:
1) women@ needs a stable web site with content controlled by committers
who are granted karma to a women svn repo. Others, including other
Apache committers, are welcome to submit patches, which would be
committed after review.
2) The wiki, which already exists, should be a secondary source of
information, not the primary.
3) In addition to the public women@ mail list, a private list should be
created to ensure that any sensitive issues have a place to be handled.
Every project needs volunteers who commit to manage it:
- update the web site
- review and commit patches submitted by others
- respond to questions posted to the list
- vote in more committers to the project
- provide periodic status reports
I had originally thought in terms of women@ moving under the PRC, but
discussions earlier in the week suggested that some kind of committee
would be a more likely fit. In any event, the Board could determine the
best structure after we have assembled enough volunteers to approach
them with a proposal.
And that's what we need right now: volunteers.
So far we have two:
- Jean Anderson [1]
- Noirin Plunkett [2]
Any other volunteers?
regards,
-jean
[1]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%3c44C43DDB.50303@bristowhill.com%3e
[2]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%3c20060724155201.GB16676@dochas.stdlib.net%3e
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Multilingual projects [Re: women@a.o mail list]
Posted by Andrus Adamchik <aa...@apache.org>.
On Jul 28, 2006, at 4:03 PM, Gianugo Rabellino wrote:
> this might be a good chance to bring forward a pet peeve of mine:
> there is more than just sex as an issue to address when it comes to
> diversity. The first thing that comes to my mind is the language
> barrier: while it's perfectly understandable that Apache has been
> an english speaking community, this nevertheless means we're
> somewhat leaving a lot of potential outside our fence. I for one
> know a lot of people here in Italy who are either non or under
> participating due to their poor (or perceived as such) knowledge of
> English.
Same here. Spent lots of time in the past few years in Belarus (my
native country) and Russia. There is lots of people who are doing or
attempting to do open source development, but don't get too far
because of the language barrier. Even registering a project on
SourceForge turned to be a problem for some guys (who are otherwise
extremely smart developers), let alone communication on the mailing
lists with the English speaking community.
Another real-life example was Japan - it turned out that a number of
big and small companies there used our product, but there was no
participation or communication with anybody from Japan, so we likely
missed on a lot of feedback and improvement ideas.
> Note: I don't have a solution handy, yet it might be interesting to
> discuss the issue and see if we can do something about it.
I don't have a solution either, but the fact that a solution would
bring so much more fresh talent to the open source world should
encourage work in this direction. I can think of a few steps that can
be taken:
* parallel native language mailing lists for the existing projects
that have substantial non-English speaking communities.
* make it a matter of policy to accept incubator proposals for the
projects in other languages (post this visibly on the Incubator web
site, and translate it, to encourage people submitting such
proposals). If and when we have such proposal, we'll be able to
develop a better insight into what it takes to run multilingual
community.
Of course there are problems with that as well. There have to be
multilingual people on the PMC to serve as an alias between wider ASF
community and the project community. All issues requiring a vote will
have to be translated to all languages involved, etc.
Thoughts?
Andrus
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Re: women@a.o mail list
Posted by Gianugo Rabellino <gi...@apache.org>.
On Jul 28, 2006, at 9:03 PM, Roy T. Fielding wrote:
> On Jul 28, 2006, at 7:49 AM, Jean T. Anderson wrote:
>
>> The women@apache.org mail list was created in August 2005; the
>> initial
>> charter is at http://wiki.apache.org/Women/InitialCharter .
>>
>> We now want to take it to the next step and create a formal committee
>> (see the forwarded post below).
>
> Sorry, -1. The foundation should not be building infrastructure
> around
> an inherently sexist and discriminatory group. [This comment has
> nothing
> to do with the participants -- it is the way the topic is defined.]
>
> If the discussion list has helped identify specific problems that can
> be addressed, or non-discriminatory topics (such as "communication")
> upon which meaningful work can be performed regardless of gender,
> then that is what you should be making a proposal about.
I tend to agree with Roy, but this might be a good chance to bring
forward a pet peeve of mine: there is more than just sex as an issue
to address when it comes to diversity. The first thing that comes to
my mind is the language barrier: while it's perfectly understandable
that Apache has been an english speaking community, this nevertheless
means we're somewhat leaving a lot of potential outside our fence. I
for one know a lot of people here in Italy who are either non or
under participating due to their poor (or perceived as such)
knowledge of English. Note: I don't have a solution handy, yet it
might be interesting to discuss the issue and see if we can do
something about it.
There are a few other potential discriminations, such as cultural and
logistical issues, not to mention technical problems due to the
increasing amount of bandwith that participation requires. I tend to
think there is some potential for an open discussion and maybe a call
to action to see what we can do to increase diversity as a value we
care about.
--
Gianugo Rabellino
Sourcesense - making sense of Open Source: http://www.sourcesense.com
Blogging at http://www.rabellino.it/blog/
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Re: women@a.o mail list
Posted by "Jean T. Anderson" <jt...@apache.org>.
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
...
> What would you say to a committee, of which women@ would be a component, to
> improve and encourage a diverse and healthy ASF community, ensuring that
> everyone who wants to work on an ASF project or otherwise participate within
> the ASF feels able and welcomed to do so? Would that work for you?
Absolutely! +1000
-jean
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RE: women@a.o mail list
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
Jean,
As you know, I tend to agree with the view that the issues are not
gender-based, but the reality is that gender does play a role, even if it
only played that role in the minds of women. Case in point being the woman
who likened it to going to a gym, and being more comfortable with a female
personal trainer than a male one.
And I related a similar story at the last BOF from recent personal
experience having abosolutely nothing to do with gender, but having to do
with comfort in situations where one is not a member of the ... prevailing
group, shall we say.
In both cases, the discomfort may be entirely in the mind of the individual,
with no basis in reality, but that does in no way effect its reality.
And, unfortunately, situations have arisen lately that point to a need for
people to be more aware of how they effect those around them, and how to
deal with situations.
What would you say to a committee, of which women@ would be a component, to
improve and encourage a diverse and healthy ASF community, ensuring that
everyone who wants to work on an ASF project or otherwise participate within
the ASF feels able and welcomed to do so? Would that work for you?
--- Noel
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Re: women@a.o mail list
Posted by "Jean T. Anderson" <jt...@apache.org>.
Roy T. Fielding wrote:
> On Jul 28, 2006, at 7:49 AM, Jean T. Anderson wrote:
>
>> The women@apache.org mail list was created in August 2005; the initial
>> charter is at http://wiki.apache.org/Women/InitialCharter .
>>
>> We now want to take it to the next step and create a formal committee
>> (see the forwarded post below).
>
> Sorry, -1. The foundation should not be building infrastructure around
> an inherently sexist and discriminatory group. [This comment has nothing
> to do with the participants -- it is the way the topic is defined.]
>
> If the discussion list has helped identify specific problems that can
> be addressed, or non-discriminatory topics (such as "communication")
> upon which meaningful work can be performed regardless of gender,
> then that is what you should be making a proposal about.
I agree that there might be another way to better address the issues,
which is why I wrote in that post:
> I had originally thought in terms of women@ moving under the PRC, but
> discussions earlier in the week suggested that some kind of committee
> would be a more likely fit. In any event, the Board could determine the
> best structure after we have assembled enough volunteers to approach
> them with a proposal.
So, suggestions that have been floated to date have included the prc
(this idea was pretty much abandoned), a project, or a committee. The
starts of discussion threads include [1], [2] and [3].
In fact, the Board might toss *all* of those out and suggest an entirely
different way, which would be fine. I don't much care *how* it gets
done. I just care that there be a mechanism to deal effectively with
issues. My goal right now is to assemble a list of volunteers who will
commit to actively help out.
-jean
[1]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200606.mbox/%3c87lksdtwzs.fsf@gemini.sunstarsys.com%3e
[2]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%3c44C3EB0D.8050401@apache.org%3e
[3]
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%3c44C985BD.8090007@bristowhill.com%3e
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Re: women@a.o mail list
Posted by "Roy T. Fielding" <fi...@gbiv.com>.
On Jul 28, 2006, at 7:49 AM, Jean T. Anderson wrote:
> The women@apache.org mail list was created in August 2005; the initial
> charter is at http://wiki.apache.org/Women/InitialCharter .
>
> We now want to take it to the next step and create a formal committee
> (see the forwarded post below).
Sorry, -1. The foundation should not be building infrastructure around
an inherently sexist and discriminatory group. [This comment has nothing
to do with the participants -- it is the way the topic is defined.]
If the discussion list has helped identify specific problems that can
be addressed, or non-discriminatory topics (such as "communication")
upon which meaningful work can be performed regardless of gender,
then that is what you should be making a proposal about.
....Roy
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Re: women@a.o mail list
Posted by Ben Hyde <bh...@pobox.com>.
+1
On Jul 28, 2006, at 10:49 AM, Jean T. Anderson wrote:
> The women@apache.org mail list was created in August 2005; the initial
> charter is at http://wiki.apache.org/Women/InitialCharter .
>
> We now want to take it to the next step and create a formal committee
> (see the forwarded post below).
>
> Since the women@ list isn't well publicized, I'd like to get the word
> out that it exists, so feel free to forward this to other Apache
> lists.
> Also, we're looking for more volunteers, so if this seems like a fish
> you'd like to fry [1], you'd be most welcome.
>
> regards,
>
> -jean
>
> [1]
> http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%
> 3c44B7E4DB.5090209@sbcglobal.net%3e
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: [PROPOSAL] Move women@ to a project or committee
> Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 20:34:21 -0700
> From: Jean T. Anderson <jt...@bristowhill.com>
> Reply-To: women@apache.org, jta@bristowhill.com
> To: women@apache.org
>
> My post earlier this week [1] was buried in a response to an older
> thread, so I'm reviving it with its very own subject. This post
> summarizes the main points and includes feedback from earlier in
> the week.
>
> women@ should become a project or committee (specific structure to be
> determined). Some reasons include:
>
> 1) women@ needs a stable web site with content controlled by
> committers
> who are granted karma to a women svn repo. Others, including other
> Apache committers, are welcome to submit patches, which would be
> committed after review.
>
> 2) The wiki, which already exists, should be a secondary source of
> information, not the primary.
>
> 3) In addition to the public women@ mail list, a private list
> should be
> created to ensure that any sensitive issues have a place to be
> handled.
>
> Every project needs volunteers who commit to manage it:
>
> - update the web site
> - review and commit patches submitted by others
> - respond to questions posted to the list
> - vote in more committers to the project
> - provide periodic status reports
>
> I had originally thought in terms of women@ moving under the PRC, but
> discussions earlier in the week suggested that some kind of committee
> would be a more likely fit. In any event, the Board could determine
> the
> best structure after we have assembled enough volunteers to approach
> them with a proposal.
>
> And that's what we need right now: volunteers.
>
> So far we have two:
>
> - Jean Anderson [1]
> - Noirin Plunkett [2]
>
> Any other volunteers?
>
> regards,
>
> -jean
>
> [1]
> http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%
> 3c44C43DDB.50303@bristowhill.com%3e
> [2]
> http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/www-women/200607.mbox/%
> 3c20060724155201.GB16676@dochas.stdlib.net%3e
>
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> To unsubscribe, e-mail: community-unsubscribe@apache.org
> For additional commands, e-mail: community-help@apache.org
>
>
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